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The former Bosnian Muslim commander at Srebrenica has been found guilty of war crimes against Bosnian Serbs.
Naser Oric was convicted by The Hague war crimes tribunal of failing to prevent men under his command killing and mistreating Bosnian Serb prisoners.

He was sentenced to two years in jail, but will be freed as he has already spent three years behind bars

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Bosnian Muslim guilty but freed

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Subsequently, on February 12, 2004, testifying at the International Criminal Tribunal in The Hague, General Morillon stressed that the Muslim commander in Srebrenica, Naser Oric, "engaged in attacks during Orthodox holidays and destroyed villages, massacring all the inhabitants. This created a degree of hatred that was quite extraordinary in the region, and this prompted the region of Bratunac in particular---that is the entire Serb population---to rebel against the very idea that through humanitarian aid one might help the population that was present there."

Asked by the ICTY prosecutor how Oric treated his Serb prisoners, General Morillon, who knew him well, replied that "Naser Oric was a warlord who reigned by terror in his area and over the population itself. I think that he realized that these were the rules of this horrific war, that he could not allow himself to take prisoners. According to my recollection, he didn't even look for an excuse. It was simply a statement: One can't be bothered with prisoners."

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Some background

They owe him reparations!

I know the Milosevic side will never accept anything the International Court does, it is like a broken record. (They haven't mentioned that Mrs. Milosevic has now been indicted by a SERBIAN court, though.)

But people comparing sentences, and claiming unfairness, should at least make reference to the following:

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In court, Oric listened impassively as the lengthy verdict was read out.

He was acquitted of direct involvement in the murder or cruel treatment of Serbs, and of responsibility for the "wanton destruction" of homes and property.

But he was found guilty of failing to control and discipline men under his command.

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That is different from ORDERING the murders.

For those who are not stuck in the "Serbian get the shaft" groove, it might be interesting to think about who else has, just recently, failed to prevent torture by soldiers under direct command.

I'll be talking about THAT implication of this court decision, and not about poor victimized Serbia. That's a silly myth.

[ 20 July 2006: Message edited by: jeff house ]

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"Naser Oric was a warlord who reigned by terror in his area and over the population itself. I think that he realized that these were the rules of this horrific war, that he could not allow himself to take prisoners. According to my recollection, he didn't even look for an excuse. It was simply a statement: One can't be bothered with prisoners."

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[ 20 July 2006: Message edited by: Cueball ]

The allegation was always that Milosevic was personally responsible for ordering war crimes.

In this instance, whatever the allegation, the actual crime proven was inattentiveness to crimes being committed by troops who should have been under the defendant's control.

Choosing the testimony of one witness and asking "was he lying" is not really productive of anything. Presumably, there were dozens of witnesses, and their testimony was weighed as all testimony was.

The verdict of "inattentiveness" is one which would have been available for Milosevic's defenders, too, had he lived through the trial.

Serbs, are being handed down life sentences for various war crimes during the Bosnian conflict, Oric, a Bosnian Muslim get a 2 year sentence.

Of course you aren't interested in highlighting how hollow your principles are, and the really grave foolishness, that you and other people who would like to present themselves as representatives of the "human rights community, have engaged in here, in the name of applying international law.

But here you are asserting the same defence for Oric, that Milosovic would have mounted, basicly that he had no control of the forces which committed attrocities. However, in the case of Milosivic despite the fact that there is very little evidence that he had any control whatsoever over the day to day operations of Serb militias in Bosnia, is damnable as an international war criminal because he engaged in a "joint criminal enterprise," while Oric, who was directly the commander of the Bosnian Muslim forces in Srebrenica, whom the ICTY clearly agree committed war crimes against Serbs, is merely guilty of failing to control his subordinates.

Hypocrisy.

It is crazy, in the US army soldiers can get 2 years for being AWOL, but you deem it just that an officer whose dereliction of duty (according to the ICTY) resulted in massacres of hundreds of people (if not thousands,) should get the same?

Not even a peep of dismay from you at such an obviously lopsided result.

[ 23 July 2006: Message edited by: Cueball ]

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(5) UNPROFOR was caught between two fires. The supposed demilitarisation in the enclave was virtually a dead letter. The Bosnian army (ABiH) followed a deliberate strategy of using limited military actions to tie up a relatively large part of the manpower of the Bosnian Serbian army (VRS) to prevent it from heading in full force for the main area around Sarajevo. This was also done from the Srebrenica enclave. ABiH troops had no qualms about breaking all the rules in skirmishes with the VRS. They provoked fire by the Bosnian Serbs and then sought cover with a Dutchbat unit which then ran the risk of being caught between two fires. On the other hand, the VRS blockade policy was a significant contributor to a frustrating and demotivating situation. As a result, the strength of Dutchbat III had been depleted by one third by the beginning of July 1995 and there was a serious shortage of supplies, from food to diesel oil for the vehicles. The last two battalions in particular became mentally and physically exhausted in the course of their mission.

(5) With hindsight there are no indications that the increased activity of the VRS in East Bosnia at the beginning of July 1995 was aimed at anything more than a reduction of the safe area Srebrenica and an interception of the main road to Zepa. The plan of campaign was drawn up on 2 July. The attack commenced on 6 July. It was so successful and so little resistance was offered that it was decided late in the evening of 9 July to press on and to see whether it was possible to take over the entire enclave.

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Dutch report on the Srebrencia enclave

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10) The decision on mass executions was most probably made after 11 July when it became clear that the breakout led by the 28th division prevented the handling of affairs that had been planned. No written order has been found. The outbreak was a complete surprise, and it came at a very bad time for the VRS. Along with the already existing hatred, eagerness for revenge and the wish for ethnic cleansing, it was one of the factors that led the Bosnian Serbs to settle accounts harshly with the Muslim population of the enclave. This turned into an organised mass slaughter. It is unlikely that is was planned long in advance with this specific form and scope. It is more plausible to suppose that the Bosnian Serbians had counted on a surrender of the ABiH troops and a deportation of the population from the enclave after 'screening for war criminals' and transfer of the troops to prisoner-of-war camps.

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And the Dutch government report, based on the eyewitness accounts of thier staff, officers and soldiers who were there, repeatedly assert that the killings by Serb militias were planned locally and spontanesouly by the local command, and even specifically state that:

"There are a number of indications that it was a central command from the General Staff of the VRS. There are none pointing to political or military liaison with Belgrado."

Or, they can claim that they didn't know anything about it, and had no command relationship to the troops which committed the crime.

That's what Milosevic argued, and that's what this fellow also argued.

In this case, the court found that he DID have a command relationship, but that there was insufficient evidence that he had ordered the murders. Therefore, he was found guilty of a lesser offence after three years in jail.

In Milosevic's case, he made very similar claims.
Indeed, these claims are made by most commanders in most situations involving marauding soldiers and the murder of civilians.

Those claims were never adjudicated, because Milosevic died.

Using that logic we can assert that since the Milosovic trial was never concluded we must assert that he is not guilty, and you can just shut up about it. Right?

And then of course the Dutch report is the closest thing we have to an unbiased, and completed review of the events at Srebrenica, and we agree that they are correct when they assert:

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There are a number of indications that it was a central command from the General Staff of the VRS (whom allowed the killing of Bosnian Muslim prisoners.) There are none pointing to political or military liaison with Belgrado.

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So where is the hypocrisy? The hypocrisy is that even though every single Serb commander who has made the same defence as Nasser Oric, (that troops unde his command where out of control, as they all do as you rightly pointed out) but it is only Oric who gets off.

[ 23 July 2006: Message edited by: Cueball ]

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How convenient. What is the point in sneaking around a legal technicality as part of open political discourse? It might work in a court Jeff, but is hardly makes you seem to be someone who is engaging in an honest attempt at apraissing the facts.

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If you make extravagant and wrong-headed claims about legal decisions, there is nothing wrong with pointing out the distinctions, which are not "technicalities", but rather real differences between the two situations.

The fact that the prosecution could not prove the more serious charges against Orsic proves nothing about the cases against anyone else.

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Originally posted by jeff house:
And the fact that Orsic did three years in jail may seem to you like nothing, but I'll bet that it seemed like punishment to him.

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Oh my my. I think I will let you have the last word there.

Hilarious.

It is this: I obviously have no sympathy for this man, but am unwilling to assume, without evidence, that he deserves more time in custody than the three years he got.

Normally, in Western countries, there is a big difference in the penalties imposed for deliberate acts, on the one hand, and acts based on criminal negligence.

The latter get much lower penalties.

As well, in civil war situations, only the biggest criminals get long sentences. That is also the principle behind Truth Commissions, as in South Africa. While it is recognised that killing someone is horrible, it is also recognised that getting beyond the cycle of violence is also required.

In Nicaragua, the Sandinistas held trials for members of Somoza's National Guard, men who could be tied to killings under direction from President-for-Life Somoza.

Commonly, they got a sentence of three years, so as not to inflame relatives and friends, and in the intrerests of peace.

The Srebrenica Report

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Originally posted by Tom Vouloumanos:
Jeff, I would like to suggest the following link (concerning Srebrenica and Naser Oric's role):

The Srebrenica Report

for you review.

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Interested babblers may consult the ten or so other threads in which the same people make the same arguments.

What is relevant, is that portions of the international human rights movement, and its attendant legal community, have allowed their collective name to be dragged through the mud for the purposes of serving what is clearly the cynical aims of the the US government and its allies, in the name of a balanced international order.

This decision, as with the whole of the prosecutions so far prove once again the politicized nature of the whole process.

What amazes me is that champions of the Democratic party in the USA still cling to their pathetic excuses, such as the fair adjudication of war crimes charges and the defence of human rights, as causus beli for the NATO manipulations and outright military attacks against Yugolsalvia and Serbia-Montenegro.

Not only that. The Clinton adminstration set the precedent, whereby NATO or any other group of nations or individual nations could presume upon itself the right to intevene in the internal affairs of others states without refferal to the United Nations.

No such "equitable" defence of Human Rights occurred.

In fact, while people like Jeff House ask, "why no UN force of Southern Lebanon," they avoid the uncomfortable truth that it was the Democrats themselves that first asserted that NATO had the right to intervene in the internal affairs of other states, based on whatever pretext they like, be it "peacekeeping," elimination of "weapons of mass destruction," or the "protection of human rights."

It was Clinton who opened the Pandora's box of the new world disorder, not Bush and DIck Chenney.

[ 24 July 2006: Message edited by: Cueball ]

It was a bad deal.

And more importantly why did they lend their support to an agressive military action against Serbia in 1999, without insisting that such an action must be condoned by UN. Louise Arbour, as special prosecutor for the ICTY was a fundamental in laying down the propoganda framework for the NATO intervention?

You see the problem is that if you allow NATO, an organization that has no official relationship to the UN, to assert that it can take upon itself the right to enforce UN resolutions condemning Serbian human rights abuses, by extenstion you also set the precedent whereby the USA, (and its "coalition of the willing" -- sic) can enforce UN resolution condemning (supposed) Iraqi intransigence to UN weapons inspectors without an explicit "use of force" mandate from the UN, or today Israel asserting that it has the right enforce UN resolution 1559, without an explicit writ from the UN allowing it to do such.

You see, prior to the Clinton, Albright, Cook decision to circumvent Article 51 of the UN charter, which explicitly curtails military activity to defensive measures until such a time as the UN can properly intervene, it was against international protocol to break the soveirgnty of another state withou immediate "just cause," of a defensive natire.

Notice, even, that George Bush 1, went all the way to the UN to get a "use of force" resolution to effect an Iraqi evacuation of Kuwait in 1991.

Now we have an international situation where just about anyone can claim that they are "fighting terrorism," "preventing nuclear proliferation," "defending human rights," or "averting potential genocide," and then start bombing and invading as they please.

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Honestly, I don't have the time, because "persecution of Serbia" is not a core issue with me.

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I find it very unfortunate that you think it a waste a time to look into the alternative writings and findings on the Yugoslavian dissster. (especially work by Ed Herman, Diane Johnstone, and Michel Chossudovsky).

I find it also unfortunate that you claim that those who bring these issues up have the "persecution of Serbia" as a "core issue" rather than those other core issue: Corporate Media manipulation (i.e. the manufacture of consent), US-NATO imperialism, International Law. Basically, it is the same type of "core issue" that inspires one to look intot the middle east more careful or Latin America or to look into how the MEDIA fucntion or what is the influence of corporate power within Representative democracies or what are th Imperial ambitions of the part of the world in which we live (the states such as ours under US Hegemony or should I say State-Corporate Hegemony).

Looking into the findings from the same people who have argued about media manipulatation on so many other issues (Vietnam, Latin America, I speak of Herman more precisely) is not to make good guys out of some and monsters out of others it is to look at our own faces in the mirror and see how we are involved and how we act and how we are manipulated.

These are very important issues that remain pertinent right now.

Whether it is the Liberal New Humanitarianism or the Neo-Conservative Pre-emptive Stike it remains the double headed eagle of the same agenda with worthy victims and unworthy victims as we have seen in so many conflicts around the world.

The Yugoslavia case is such an example. It is important for those on the Left to look into these reports and studies and I find it unfortunate to brush them aside as mere "persecution theories".

Let me be more clear, whether the analogy is fitting or not. Is the middle east story about the persecution of Palestinians, is it about the persecution of Arabs, or of Muslims? Or does it have to do with other geopolitical interests? These interests being in tandem with US Corporate interests (arms industry, oil, prevention of a competing power). One can easily swallow the story of the lone democratic jewish State within a sea of reprehensible dictatorial and corrupt Muslim states who wish to drive the Jews to the sea or one can see what is really going on. Does that justify suicide bombing, no of course not. Does it turn any of the Arab leaders into great heroes or Humanitarians? No of course not. Does it show a great conspiracy against Muslims and Arabs? Again, no it does not.

What it does demonstrate though, is that there are interests within our part of the world in that part of the world and that the MEDIA wishes to perpetuate a certain view of events.

The same goes for every other world conflict. If Chomsky has taught us anything in his decades of activism it is this simple fact.

The Yugoslavian catastrophe is no exception. There were interests for its destrcution and as MEDIA support for a certain version of events. Nothing new here, this is not conspiratorial at all, it's like Korea, Vietnam, Indonesia/Timor/West Papua, Nicaragua, El Salvador,Afghanistan, Iraq, Venezuela, Palestine etc. etc. etc.

Unfortunately nothing new.

Hence, is is not the persecution of Serbs or Serbia or of Arabs or of Muslims that is the story behind any of these catastrophes it is what role do our governments play in whose interests and how does the Corporate MEDIA tell the story. Again, nothing new. It is the same motivation.

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Originally posted by Cueball:
I am not talking about Palestine. I am talking about Israel taking it upon itself the right to enforce UN resolution 1559 and in so doing directly breaching the sovereignty of Lebanon.

How does that differ, in a legal sense, just on the bare bones, with NATO taking it upon itself the right to enforce UN resolutions regarding Serbia in 1999 by breaching the sovereignty of Serbia?

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My point is that rather than set the groundwork for a new framework for international law, Louise Arbour et al have succeeded in destroying one of the fundamental principle of international law that being the soveriegnty of states, to the effect that any state can go around claiming whatever it wants, and then go ahead and do whatever it wants.

It is no coincidence for instance that Turkey has recently started chaffing at the bit to get at Kurdish militants taking refuge in the former-state of Iraq. They will do no such thing, of course. But the fact that they can suggest such, and put preassure on the US to go after Kurdish militants themselves is entirely the result of the new world disorder that Louise Arbour helped unleash in the world.

After all if NATO can bomb Serbia to effect the arrest of Slobodan Milosovic, then Israel can bomb Lebanon to get at Hizbollah, and so on and so on.

[ 25 July 2006: Message edited by: Cueball ]

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After all if NATO can bomb Serbia to effect the arrest of Slobodan Milosovic, then Israel can bomb Lebanon to get at Hizbollah, and so on and so on.

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Exactly. Furthermore, the US and Israel can sponsor a "international" tribunal to prosecute the leaders of Hizbollah, as well as the leadership of Lebanon itself for having "supported" Hizbullah and then even lay charges against Assad in Syria etc. etc. etc. After all, Hizbullah is an "official terrorist organization" and "we are at war against terror".

If we are to believe the official media story, that is this new war has been provoked by a terrorist organization Hizbullah which kidnapped Israeli soldiers and which is bombing Israel since it wants to drive the Jews into the Sea. Then Israel has the right to defend itself and furthermore, eradicate this terrorist threat and the US has an obligation to help democratic states fight terror. Then it all fits perfectly.

Of course, the fact that Israel had nitially kidnapped a Palestinian leader and his son is not mentioned. Also not mentioned is the fact that that the Israeli government has been looking for a pretext for regime change in Lebanon in order to isolate Syria and reassert its power in the region. Furthermore, Israeli bombing has targetted civilian areas also put to the side is Israel's brutal occupation of Palestinians.

Now the Yugoslavian catastrophe is different in many respects but of course the media supported the US version of events in order to justify the Bombing of Yugolavia and its dissentigration as well as regime channge. The ICTY further helped to legitimize all of this.

The differences in tactics are between the Liberal New-Humanitatian Interventionism (one needs official victims Bosnia's Muslims, Kosovo Albanians) and the Neo-Conservative Pre-emptive strike (once needs official dangers: Terror, WMD etc.) Different propaganda reasons but the exact same motivation: Stae-Corporate Geopolitical reasons, which have been summarized by William Blum as the following:

a) access to resources (petroleum, gas, water, food, precious materials etc.)
b) making the world safe for American corporations (basically getting people out of the way so that US inc. can do what it wants, where it wants and how it wants);
c) enhancing the financial statements of defense contractors at home who have contributed generously to members of congress (public subsidy for private profit);
d) preventing the rise of any society that might serve as a successful example of an alternative to a capitalist model that does not compete with US State-Corporate interests but is subserveitn to them ;
e) extending political and economic hegemony over as wide an area as possible, as befits a "great power."

All of these reasons played a role in the Yugoslavian catastrophe.

a) Preventing Germany from getting too much influence in the region and having control over pipelines that will flow through the Balkans from the the Caucuses (remember Hitler wanted to get access to this Oil)

b) What remained of the Yugoslavian model still had some protectinism under Milosevic and he did not fully sell off state corporations.

c) The US definitely sold more weapons and showed the public that its military is important in order to justify increase in defense budget spending.

d) As mentioned above Yugoslavia (Serbia-Montenegro) did not fully dismantle its state backed sector nor did it fully remove worker self-management. Milosevic moved closer to capitalism but not fast enough or enthusiatically enough like leaders in the breakway republics. Yugoslavia was in the mind of many Balkan countries and middle eastern counties as well an example of a successful econmic country that smaller states can emulate.

e)Of course, this all happened after the end of the "cold war", NATO needed to refind itself it was its fifiteuth anniversary and the US needed to redefine its imperial role as the New Humanitarian Policeman of the World..that's the old British "white man's Burden".

The middle east s similar, events in Venezuela are similar.

Nothing new or complicated here.

Yugoslavia was no exception.

Does any of this make Hizbullah leaders great men and wash their hands of any crimes. No of course not. Does it justrify for them to be preosecute in kangaroo courts that serve to justify US-Israeli crimes. No of course not.

This is why such interventions and tribunals should not be supported. What we need is a real UN backed International Court.

We had one, the US ignored the most important International judgment on state sovereignty and state Terrorism when Nicaragua took the US to this World Court.

How can any leftist or progressive or democratic person support unilateral interventions and kangaroo courts that make a mockery of any system of international law is beyond me.

At the time of Milosevic's crimes, no such court existed.

Some thought this meant that he should go free, no matter what he may have done.

Others, like myself, thought that it would be possible to create a court to try him. The Nuremburg trials were generally fair, even though it was the victors who created them.

A final possibility was "trial in Serbia". This was always a non-starter in practical terms, since Milosevic still controlled a good chunk of the state apparatus. The kinds of nonsense which have occurred in Saddam's trial in Iraq show how poor a choice this would have been.

Post 1998, there is a new criminal court with broad jurisdiction. It needs strengthening, but is the best existing alternative to impunity.

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To initiate a war of aggression, therefore, is not only an international crime, it is the supreme international crime differing only from other war crimes in that it contains within itself the accumulated evil of the whole."

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In other words your arguement justifies engaging in the supreme international crime for the puroposes of preventing lesser crimes, crimes which the court points out directly result from engaging in the "supreme international crome."

The truth of this can be seen in the result of the NATO coampaign against Serbia and Kosovo, what with the massive destruction of civilian infrastructure, the killing of numerous Serbs and even Kosovars (1500+)through "collateral damage," as well as the creation of massive refugee problem involving hundreds of thousands of people.

What more do we need to know about "the accumulated evil of the whole" than that it is likely that as many (or more) people were killed by the NATO attacks, as have been turned up as killed by Serb police and army in their war against the KLA.

[ 28 July 2006: Message edited by: Cueball ]

NATO doesn't even have observer status at the UN. The way you have it any set of nations can band together and decide whatever they like.

But there are situations which present critical human rights problems, but which may not command a unanimous Security Council vote.

China, for example, may not care very much about human rights violations. It may exercise its veto. The veto is potentially an exercise in power politics; it does not have to be justified in any way.

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Originally posted by jeff house:

But there are situations which present critical human rights problems, but which may not command a unanimous Security Council vote.

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That is what GWB, Chenney and Powell argued prior to invading Iraq.

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Originally posted by Cueball:
Well you see, the whole idea behind setting up the ICTY, and the inetervention in Bosnia et al was to set a new standard of international law. This was to be a historic project, slowly piecing together a new system of international relations whereby humanitarian law was strictly enforced. Or at least this is how it has been justified.

My point is that rather than set the groundwork for a new framework for international law, Louise Arbour et al have succeeded in destroying one of the fundamental principle of international law that being the soveriegnty of states, to the effect that any state can go around claiming whatever it wants, and then go ahead and do whatever it wants.

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I don't know if can just lump all of them in together, as the original idea was supposed to be inspired by the Nurnberg trials. There too the US 'intervened' in other nation's wars and took part in what surely would be called war crimes now -ie: the firebombing of Dresden and Tokyo. The nature of the proceedings were even more a "victors" one-sided justice but I doubt if it had a huge impact on the actual cold war that followed. I'm also not sure what relationship Arbour pursuing Milosevic after the fact had on the original decision to intervene in Serbia.

[QUOTE}
After all if NATO can bomb Serbia to effect the arrest of Slobodan Milosovic, then Israel can bomb Lebanon to get at Hizbollah, and so on and so on.
[/QUOTE]

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Originally posted by EriKtheHalfaRed:

I would also suggest that one is not necessarily causal to another. In Iraq for another example the UN eventually said no, but the US and Britain and a few satellites moved in regardless. It could as easily be argued that the Iraq war was as much a sign of the UN weakness as strength, but again comes down to relative power relationships, something that would exist regardless.

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But I don't see how asserting the weakness of the UN, and thereby essentially supporting the US subversion of it as has been argued a necessary by House and others, does anything to reinforces the UN. Instead the people like House and Arbour are undermining the drive to make the UN effective by adding their voice to chorus saying that the UN is ineffective.

One would think that serious human rights activists interested in furthring the cause of creating a legitimate world order baased on international law would be insisting that the letter of the law be upheld under a UN mandate as the primary authority able to adjudicate and enforce international disputes.

The UN will always be weak, unless people insist that member states respect its authority as the only authority. To argue otherwise is merely to perptuate the self-fullfilling prophesy.

Why should Serbia be expected to respect the authority of the UN in regards to its internal policies, when its detractors show so much willingness to do likewise?

[ 28 July 2006: Message edited by: Cueball ]

[ 28 July 2006: Message edited by: EriKtheHalfaRed ]

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Bosnian Muslim sentence contested

Prosecutors at the UN war crimes tribunal in The Hague have appealed against a sentence given to a former Bosnian Muslim commander in Srebrenica.

Naser Oric, 39, was convicted by the tribunal of failing to prevent men under his command killing and mistreating Bosnian Serb prisoners.

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